Author: Ku HL, Lin CS, Chao HT, Tu PC, Li CT, Cheng CM, Su TP, Lee YC, Hsieh JC.
Affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan ; Integrated Brain Research Unit, Department of Medical Research and Education, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan ; Department of Psychiatry, Shuang Ho Hospital, Taipei Medical University, Taipei, Taiwan.
Conference/Journal: PLoS One.
Date published: 2013 Jul 26
Other:
Volume ID: 8 , Issue ID: 7 , Pages: e70808 , Special Notes: doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0070808 , Word Count: 153
Abstract
Individuals with gender identity disorder (GID), who are commonly referred to as transsexuals (TXs), are afflicted by negative psychosocial stressors. Central to the psychological complex of TXs is the conviction of belonging to the opposite sex. Neuroanatomical and functional brain imaging studies have demonstrated that the GID is associated with brain alterations. In this study, we found that TXs identify, when viewing male-female couples in erotic or non-erotic ("neutral") interactions, with the couple member of the desired gender in both situations. By means of functional magnetic resonance imaging, we found that the TXs, as opposed to controls (CONs), displayed an increased functional connectivity between the ventral tegmental area, which is associated with dimorphic genital representation, and anterior cingulate cortex subregions, which play a key role in social exclusion, conflict monitoring and punishment adjustment. The neural connectivity pattern suggests a brain signature of the psychosocial distress for the gender-sex incongruity of TXs.
PMID: 23923023